CMS board approves changes as part of $100M budget-cutting plan

The Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools Board of Education has approved changing school bell schedules and reducing funding for its weighted-student staffing program as part of a plan by Superintendent Peter Gorman to cut $100 million from the district’s 2011-12 operating budget.

The board gave its approval this week.

But the board deferred a third recommendation from Gorman to reduce by more than half the number of Bright Beginnings prekindergarten classes.

The board is expected to vote on that recommendation Feb. 8.

Since reducing or redirecting $185 million starting in the 2007-08 budget year, CMS’ funding woes are continuing into its next budget year.

The 2011-12 cuts are the result of an anticipated decline in state funding and unknown local funding, the two primary funding sources for CMS’ operating budget.

Also drying up: federal funds from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, also known as the stimulus bill.